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Monday, January 12, 2015

Jan Dhan Yojna: Public sector lenders outshine private banks

Prime Minister Narendra Modi

WHEN Prime Minister Narendra Modi launched the ambitious Jan
Dhan Yojna, the financial inclusion scheme on August 28, 2014, the focus was on
the public sector lenders and now after about four months, the private sector
banks are way behind their PSU peers in so far as opening financial inclusion
accounts.

The public sector banks
have...opened 8.62 crore such accounts in the same period. The number of such
accounts opened by even regional rural banks stands at 1.92 crore.

The private banks with a market share of about 20 percent
have only about three percent contribution in this flagship financial inclusion
programme.

As per the latest finance ministry data, 13 private sector
banks have opened 30.47 lakh Jan Dhan bank accounts as against 8.62 crore by
state-owned banks as on January 7.

The initial target was to open 7.5 crore such accounts, but
the later it was revised upwards to 10 crore to be completed by January 26,
2015. However, this target has already been achieved.

Taking into account the regional rural banks, so far a total
of 10.84 crore Jan Dhan accounts have been opened so far by all banks in the
country.

As far as public sector banks are concerned, they have
opened more than 8.62 crore Jan Dhan accounts. Country's largest bank SBI has
opened 2.15 crore accounts, followed by Punjab National Bank (61.74 lakh), Bank
of Baroda (58.47 lakh), and Canara Bank (53.79 lakh).

The main features of the PMJDY scheme include Rs 5,000
overdraft facility for Aadhaar-linked accounts, RuPay Debit Card with inbuilt
Rs 1 lakh accident insurance cover.

Among private banks, just three of them -- HDFC Bank, ICICI Bank and J&K Bank -- account for about two-third of total accounts opened by private sector lenders.

HDFC Bank has opened 7.8 lakh such accounts, followed by ICICI Bank's 6.67 lakh and Jammu and Kashmir Bank's 6.06 lakh.

Axis Bank has opened 2.45 lakh accounts and Kotak Mahindra Bank has opened just 54,000 accounts.

Besides, account holders under the scheme will get life
insurance cover of Rs 30,000. This was additional benefit announced by the
Prime Minister during the launch of the scheme.